Sunset Hearts [The American Heroes Collection: Florida] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

by Macy Largo

  Daphne read and re-read the letters countless times. She photocopied them and read the copies because she cried so much she worried she’d ruin the originals. Every night, her ritual was to start with the first and read through them all.

  She cried every time.

  She bought a prepaid cell phone and had it activated with a Tampa area code, but hadn’t worked up the nerve to call. It was against the rules the U.S. Marshals had given her to contact Alan and Jerald without going through the marshals to do it.

  After being in her new home for two months, she finally tried Alan’s home number.

  Her heart sank when the automated tone sounded, followed by the recorded message, “The number you are trying to reach is no longer in service…”

  They must have finally ditched the land line.

  She couldn’t remember their cell numbers.

  She looked up Alan’s charter reservation number online, which would ring to his cell. When she called, one of the Aripeka marina shop clerks answered.

  “Is Alan Walker there?” Daphne asked.

  “We’re taking his bookings for him.”

  “Do you have his cell number? I need to reach him.”

  “We’re not allowed to give that out. We can pass along a message for you.”

  “Oh. Thanks. Never mind.”

  She’d fucked up. They’d never stopped loving her, and she’d been too damn angry and immature to see the truth at the time.

  It felt like she’d spent the last year crying or in a freaking daze. Time to take action.

  She awoke the next morning to a snowstorm. She stared, in awe at the strange sight. She’d never seen real snow before, and it was her first in her new hometown of Cody, Wyoming. Small town, yes, but a nice place. Friendly people.

  Fortunately she didn’t have to drive very far to the travel agency where she worked. “I know I haven’t been here long, but can I put in for some unpaid time off at Christmas?”

  Her boss, Barbara Thomas, laughed. “Honey, we close down from Christmas to New Year’s every year. Knock yourself out, but I usually pay everyone for that time.”

  “Even though I haven’t been here that long?”

  The woman’s nephew was a U.S. Marshal who had helped Daphne find the job. “It’s okay, Jenny. You work hard, you’re good with the customers. I don’t mind.”

  She sometimes had trouble answering to her new name even though she’d picked it. “Thank you.”

  That’s how the day after Christmas she found herself eagerly flying into Tampa International Airport. She knew it was against the rules, but she’d worried if she told her agent handler about it he’d forbid the trip. It’d been four long, achy months since that showdown in the courthouse. All she knew was she’d been miserable and would come out of the program if it meant she could be with her men.

  If they would take her back.

  She didn’t care about her life anymore. What good was it without her men? She just hoped they still wanted her.

  She rented a car and drove north, her stomach bound in knots. She pulled into the driveway a little before sunset and hesitated when she saw all the cars in the yard but didn’t recognize any of them. Someone was apparently having a party.

  Nervously, she walked up to the front door and knocked. The woman who answered didn’t look familiar either.

  “Can I help you?”

  Her heart sank. “I’m sorry. I’m looking for someone who used to live here. I’m sorry I interrupted your evening.”

  Fighting her tears, she turned to go.

  “Are you looking for Mr. Walker or Mr. Carter?” the woman called out.

  She stopped and turned. “Both, actually. I’m an…old friend of theirs.”

  “They live at their new house now. We’re renting from them.”

  Hope flared again. “In north Aripeka?”

  “Yes. Do you know where it is?”

  “Yes, thank you!”

  She turned to sprint to the car when the woman’s words stopped her in her tracks. “But they won’t be back from their cruise until the seventh of January. If you want to leave a message, I’ll be happy to give it to them. We’re getting their mail for them.”

  * * * *

  No, no message.

  She sat in the airport bar and stirred her drink. She’d gotten a room at the Tampa International Marriott after changing her flight to the first one she could get back the next morning. What a sucky way to spend the holidays. Although, from the way it appeared, she knew she should get used to spending them alone. A far cry from waking up last Christmas in their bed and in their arms, celebrating together as a family.

  She blinked back another wave of tears at that thought. She felt even more alone now than she had before she met them. She’d had a taste of life, of love, of belonging, and it was gone.

  The men, obviously, had moved on without her.

  She didn’t blame them.

  She’d turned in the rental car already. Despite knowing it would rip her to shreds, she drove by the new house before returning to the airport.

  It looked just like the plans.

  The men’s trucks sat parked in the driveway, but Jerald’s work truck wasn’t. She wondered where he’d left it, then she realized it wasn’t her business anymore.

  That thought brought another prickle of tears to her eyes.

  She recognized the manatee water fountain on the deck, the one she’d seen at the flea market that day and didn’t get, even though Alan wanted to buy it for her.

  She wondered when they’d bought it.

  If they’d bought it in anticipation of her coming home.

  She’d sat on their back deck and watched the sun set over the Gulf. Remembered the day she’d sat in the back of Jerald’s truck with him and talked.

  Their sunset hearts. She didn’t get sunsets like this in Wyoming. The Absaroka mountain range swallowed the sun west of town.

  Looks like the sun has finally set for good.

  * * * *

  Alan stopped by to pick up their mail the morning after they returned from their cruise. Lisa handed him the small box full of it. “Did that woman ever get hold of you?”

  “What woman?”

  “She stopped by here looking for you the day after Christmas.”

  “Did she leave her name?”

  “No.”

  “What’d she look like?”

  “Young, kind of reddish brown hair, not red. Not long, not even to her shoulders. Hazel eyes. Shorter than you. Looked really sad when I told her you guys were gone. She said she was a friend of yours.”

  Alan felt his heart seize in his chest. “Do me a favor.”

  “Sure.”

  “Never mention her to Jerald. Please. Forget you ever saw her.”

  Before she could ask questions he didn’t want to answer, he stiffly walked to his truck. He pulled out of their driveway but stopped by the marina before he returned home. A valid excuse to kill time.

  A way to get his emotions under control.

  He quickly rummaged through the box of mail, looking for anything from her. He’d never let Jerald see it. Jerald had a great time on the cruise, had finally started coming out of his shell, acting like his old self in some ways. In the good ways.

  He wouldn’t let Daphne pop in for a minute and ruin it for him.

  For both of them.

  * * * *

  Special Agent Ben Williams hung up the phone and scrubbed his face with his hands. Before him on his desk, a report from the Cody field office. Jenny Hemingway had safely returned to Wyoming.

  What troubled him was where’d she’d gone. He received monthly reports on her, knew she kept to herself, didn’t date, didn’t socialize. That she’d broke the rules and traveled to Florida only confirmed what he’d long suspected, that her mental state hadn’t improved from her time in protective custody.

  She had no idea her little holiday jaunt had been closely monitored. While technically a closed case, because of her
high value in the Scorsini trial, and because of Paulie’s pending appeals, he kept close tabs on her in case her future testimony was needed.

  He made a few phone calls, then told his administrative assistant he needed to run out to meet with a witness and drove to Aripeka.

  After finding no one at home, he drove to the marina and found Jerald Carter at work on an outboard engine. Alan Walker was nowhere to be seen.

  Good.

  Carter looked up at his approach. “What do you want?”

  Williams sat on the dock. “Just stopping by to see how you and Mr. Walker are doing.”

  Carter’s expression turned gruff. “Fine.” He went back to changing the spark plugs in the outboard.

  He cleared his throat. This was totally against protocol, but what the hell. “Retired life treating you kindly?”

  Carter nodded. “It’s okay.”

  “Getting to travel?”

  He shrugged, still not looking up at him. “We took a cruise. Thinking about going out west later this year.”

  Ah, perfect. “Really? Where?”

  “Alan’s never been to Yellowstone.”

  Fuck me, there is a God. “Hey, listen, one of my buddies, his aunt runs a travel agency in Cody that handles trips out there. He just sent me some pics from one of his trips, I think I have the info.” He pulled out his BlackBerry and pretended to scroll through it when, in reality, he’d saved the info to his memo file. He scribbled the travel agency’s info on the back of one of his business cards and handed it to Carter, who reluctantly took it.

  “Thanks, but I usually use a local place here in town.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe they can book you some backcountry fishing through that place. Been seriously thinking about going myself.”

  Carter jammed the card in his pocket. “You didn’t come here just to share travel tips. Quit blowing smoke up my ass.”

  He couldn’t reveal the truth. It would be a breach of the rules big enough to get him tossed out and jeopardize his own pension, not to mention risking her life. All he could do was give the three of them a gentle nudge in the right direction and hope they found each other. “I feel guilty, okay?” Well, that was the truth.

  “Why?”

  “I should have counseled her to talk to you guys before she made her decision.”

  Carter returned his attention to the outboard. “Yeah? Well, if my letters to her weren’t enough to convince her how we felt, how would talking have helped other than to end it faster?” He threw the socket wrench onto the deck. “Look, you come out here and start hashing this shit over, what the fuck? If you don’t have something better to do, then I would appreciate you go harass someone else. We’ve moved on, we’re over her, and we’d rather not talk about her, okay?”

  Williams nodded. “Yeah. Sorry.” He stood to go, then Carter’s soft voice stopped him.

  “Is she okay?”

  He turned. Carter stared at the deck, his fists clenched. “She’s existing,” he gently said. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say she’s okay.”

  * * * *

  Jerald stared at Williams’ back as he walked down the dock. He didn’t need this shit today. He’d had a good few days, hadn’t thought about her…much. Alan had seemed so happy following the cruise.

  He jammed his hands into his pockets and felt the business card. Well, okay, maybe the local travel agency could book through them. He did want to take Alan fly fishing. He pulled the card out and stared at it.

  Couldn’t hurt, right?

  Chapter Sixteen

  Despite Barbara Thomas’ attempts to hook her up with one of her many nephews, Jenny, as she’d finally started thinking of herself, kept to herself. She had no desire to meet anyone romantically.

  No man would ever live up to the two she’d stupidly thrown away.

  Living alone sucked. How had she done it before she’d met Paulie? Oh yeah, she’d been in school, too busy and perpetually exhausted to notice that when she fell into bed at night there wasn’t anyone waiting to hold her.

  She lay in bed most nights and tried not to think about how huge it felt, despite only being a double. She slept huddled on the far left side, pillows piled against her back and the covers tightly swaddled around her. If she closed her eyes and thought hard, she could conjure the memory of Alan’s cologne and Jerald’s scent.

  But when she did that, it usually meant more tears.

  She hated to cook for only herself. Her pantry lay pitifully barren, like her heart and dreams. She ate cereal most days for breakfast and dinner, and would get a sub sandwich from a little shop next door to the travel agency on the days she worked there. Sometimes she made her own lunch, but that also brought back memories of taking care of Jerald and Alan, making lunch for them.

  It wasn’t worth the heartache. Cheerios didn’t make her cry. They were also supposed to help lower her cholesterol.

  Bonus.

  The other bonus being she lost fifteen pounds. Clothes that used to feel tight on her now felt comfortably loose.

  Another bonus. I don’t have to go clothes shopping, except for warm stuff to keep from freezing to death.

  The majority of the travel agency’s business related to Yellowstone, the Grand Tetons and surrounding environs, usually booking incoming trips to the area, not outgoing ones by local residents. As winter set in, Jenny went on snowmobile tours into and around the park on her days off, falling in love with the extreme beauty and vastness of the place.

  She would imagine talking with Alan, describing it to him in full, vivid detail, or pretend he and Jerald were with her and seeing it as she did. As winter gave way to spring, she spent even more time there, whenever she could, until she secured a part-time job working there two days a week. It meant she didn’t have any free time, between working five days a week at the travel agency and then at Yellowstone, but it was worth it.

  It kept her busy.

  It kept her too exhausted to lay awake at night thinking about Alan and Jerald and how they were doing. Wondering if they missed her the way she missed them. Or if they’d simply gone on with their lives without another thought to the pain in the ass needy chick they’d rescued, who’d broken their hearts and gotten Alan shot.

  She wondered if Alan still felt angry at her.

  She returned from a lunch break one day at the travel agency to find a new stack of fishing guide reservation forms on her desk for her to input into their system. As she started working on them, one caught her eye and nearly stopped her heart.

  J. D. Carter and Alan Walker, for two weeks, both in Yellowstone and the Tetons, sightseeing and then several days of fly fishing with an outfitter company that booked through their agency.

  Her boss walked over. “What’s wrong, Jenny? You look like you saw a ghost.”

  “Nothing.” She put the form down and piled others on top of it. “I thought I recognized a name, but it was just a funny coincidence. Someone I used to know.” She forced a smile. “I’ll get these plugged in for you.”

  Before she left, she entered their contact numbers and itinerary information into her phone. They would be arriving in six weeks. She stopped by her boss’ desk on her way out. “Would it be okay if I took a few days off?”

  She pulled out the calendar. “When you want them?”

  Jenny flipped through and pointed. “There. A Wednesday and Thursday. I need a couple of days off in the worst way.” At least with two jobs she would have no problem paying her bills, even after she lost the government stipend she still deposited every month.

  “Sure.” She wrote it in. “Have fun. What will you do?”

  “I plan to go to Yellowstone and play tourist instead of guide.” And maybe fix the worst mistake I’ve ever made.

  * * * *

  Alan read the exhaustion in Jerald’s eyes. “You want to stay here and nap?” They’d flown out of Tampa the day before into Spokane, spent the night there, then drove to Yellowstone.

  “Yeah, I need to rest. I didn’t
sleep well last night. You go ahead and explore.”

  Alan leaned in and kissed him. “I’m going to go find some coffee and see when Old Faithful’s going to erupt.”

  “Okay.”

  He walked across the compound from where the cabins were located to the main lodge. The cabins weren’t as nice as the Old Faithful Inn, but he’d heard about them and liked the more rustic feel of them. Jerald had been happy to oblige him when making their reservations.

  He bought a cup of coffee from a snack counter inside the lodge and looked around for a few minutes. Huge timbers, rustic Old West feel to it. As beautiful as he’d imagined.

  A huge wooden sign set up like a clock in the lobby showed Old Faithful would go off in fifteen minutes. That must explain the crowd gathered outside.

  He walked down the path to join them on the boardwalk. The benches were filled, so he stood behind them, waiting as the geyser decided to make up its mind and erupt. He glanced around, tourists from every walk of life and more than a few nations.

  He caught sight of a woman standing alone at the edge of the crowd and watching him. She wore a baseball cap pulled down over her face and dark sunglasses, the afternoon sun casting a shadow that concealed her features. When he looked again, the crowd had shifted and he didn’t see her.

  He turned back to the geyser. I will not think of her! I won’t ruin my fucking vacation thinking about that woman.

  God knew he’d wasted enough time on her.

  Now he couldn’t shake the feeling he was under surveillance. The last minute geyser crowd swelled as people hurried over to watch. Then it erupted, taking everyone’s attention as steam and water shot into the air with a gurgling blast.

  I wish Daph were here.

  He blinked away tears and tried to summon his anger again. Only his anger and taking care of Jerald got him through the past almost year and a half.

  Without her.

  As the crowd thinned, drifting away along the boardwalk, he sat when a section of bench opened up. He needed to get his head on straight before he returned to the cabin to Jerald. Needed to get her out of his heart for good. He hoped this trip would do the trick. Just him and Jerald and the great outdoors with no fucking reminders of Daphne Peres every time he turned around.